


Secrets left unsaid

by Ravensmores



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Comfort, Don’t copy to another website, Dorks in Love, Fluff and Angst, Gift Exchange, Honesty, Implied Sexual Content, Love Confessions, M/M, Post-Canon, Victor Nikiforov's Past, Victuuri Summer Loving, soft soft soft, we all know he has a tragic backstory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-15
Packaged: 2020-10-19 07:14:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20653256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ravensmores/pseuds/Ravensmores
Summary: “I used to think about you quite a lot when I came here.”He sees Victor surface from his deeper thoughts at the words, an eyebrow raised as he turns back to Yuuri.“Oh really?”“I mean- nothing weird or creepy obviously,” he quickly clarifies, doing his best not to duck his head away as he tries to find the best way to explain what he really means. “When I was younger, I just used to think about what I wanted to do and what kind of skater I wanted to be. It always came back to wanting to… be like you.”Aka: two dorks in love thinking about just how they ended up here.





	Secrets left unsaid

**Author's Note:**

  * For [victuurikatsu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/victuurikatsu/gifts).

> For the ever dashing, ever lovely [Victuurikatsu](https://victuurikatsu.tumblr.com/)
> 
> I can't believe I got you in this exchange but I hope this is soft enough for you!

Spring is different for Yuuri now.

A few years ago, it was a period of almost complete aimlessness, his days tied between school and skating and his nights spent staring up at his ceiling wondering if _ this _was the year he’d even get close to matching the cool perfection of the man staring with such beautiful intent from every poster around him.

Slowly stretching out in his bed now, he can hardly believe how quickly things change.

It’s the same room, same disorganised mess on his desk, same gentle hum of the radiator whirring from the opposite wall, and yet everything just feels so much… clearer now. Like he finally has a direction- a _ purpose _to keep going.

Rolling onto his side, he knows it definitely has nothing and _ everything _to do with the man gently breathing next to him with the blankets pulled to his chin, long limbs sprawled across two thirds of his mattress.

Yuuri can’t help his sleepy smile as Victor sighs quietly and buries himself further into the pillow, his normally immaculately styled hair sticking up in a silvery mess of strange angles.

Yuuri carefully props himself up on his elbow as he reaches over to lightly brush his fingers through the worst of the tangles, letting himself indulge in the soft feel of each strand slipping like precious silk against his skin. 

Despite this hardly being the first time he’d let himself so shamelessly appreciate the unkempt perfection that was his sleeping fiancé, it still feels kind of surreal. With every movement he thinks about how all of this could so easily be a dream- being wrapped up in this sleepy, soft cocoon of blankets next to a man he’d spent most of his life staring at from the bright flicker of an old television screen… and yet here they are. In the same bedroom he spent so many years thinking about him- warm, happy and _ together. _

He inhales slowly as he gently traces the delicate arch of Victor's eyebrow causing him to shift towards the touch, a soft sigh escaping from the gentle smile on his face.

Yuuri’s world goes a little pink.

It _ has _to be a fantasy. He’d slipped and died in some terrible skating crash and this was his heaven. An eternity of simply watching his idol-turned-lover sleep happily next to him in the muted light of the breaking dawn.

For so long he’d seemed not quite real, just some ethereal figure that only existed to shine brilliant and beautiful from the sharp colours of a magazine spread- but here he was: silver hair caught between Yuuri’s wandering fingers, drool drying on his chin and the sun lightly kissing the exposed slope of his pale shoulder.

Yup. Definitely heaven.

He feels a different kind of heat twist in his gut as Victor shifts over again, revealing a few soft marks in the shape of Yuuri’s mouth blossoming in a pink bouquet down the column of his throat.

Despite the exhaustion of the travel from St. Petersburg back to Hasetsu, that hadn’t stopped the gentle exploration of Yuuri’s hands when they’d finally collapsed in bed. His fingers had slowly mapped and stroked the familiar strength of muscle under the fabric of Victor’s shirt until he’d suddenly found himself pinned to the mattress, warm lips at his ear and warmer words swimming through the air.

Neither had the energy for much teasing or finesse after that, it quickly becoming a hot wet blur of burning kisses on his skin and the bite of finger nails in his back, Yuuri muffling his desperate cries in the sweet curve of Victor’s neck as expert fingers moved inside of him with a torturous, slick efficiency. He’d already been teetering on the razor’s edge of pleasure since Victor had gently spread his thighs, but it was the soft words adoration against his collarbone that had quickly brought him to his end, desperately trying to quiet the cries of his ecstasy in his elbow to avoid any awkward looks over breakfast the next morning.

Though having already noticed the matching marks across his own neck in the mirror across from his bed, he’s fairly certain it was a fruitless effort.

After what could have been another minute or an hour of exploiting the privilege of being able to watch the beauty next to him sleep, he climbs out of bed as silently as he can, gently padding out of the bedroom and towards the bathroom.

The hallway is barely lit, soft grey-pink light filtering in through the windows just illuminating enough so he could make his way around. Looking down the hallway, he feels a soft pang of guilt for not giving everyone a proper greeting when they’d arrived from the airport. He’d been so excited to finally have the chance to see his family again after the rush that had been the last few months, yet when they’d arrived, him and Victor had barely had time to say hello before everyone was slowly shuffling off the bed, promises of _ tomorrow _mumbled against his shoulder as his mother had hugged him goodnight. 

Splashing cool water on his face, he makes a vow to make his mother the tea he’d brought back with him from Russia today, Victor swearing that it was going to be the best she’d ever tasted. Yuuri had nodded along while they were packing it up, trying not to think about how she was going to react when Victor started spooning jam into it.

Exiting the bathroom, he’s met with the first conscious eyes of the day, bright and expectant as they look him up and down with a familiar excitement.

Yuuri smiles.

“Hey Makka,” he whispers as he reaches down to pet large poodle sitting in front of him, tail thumping rhythmically against the floor. Brushing down to the soft curls of her ears, he notices her leash dropped by her feet, something definitely not there when they’d gone to bed last night.

He looks back to her, an eyebrow raised. “You want to go for a walk?”

At the mention of the word, the leash is suddenly in her mouth, her front paws launching off the floor to press against Yuuri’s torso as she lets out the softest whine.

Yuuri sighs as he rests his hand against the top of her head. “You seriously want to go right now?”

She pushes against him a little harder, leash still firmly clamped between her teeth as she nuzzles the side of her face against Yuuri’s arm.

Yuuri weighs his options for a moment before huffing out another sigh and pushing Makka off. “Okay fine.”

He’s tired. Really tired, his eyes and limbs both burning from the combination of jet lag and spending the night fitted awkwardly around Victor in his too-small bed, and yet he knows Makka is keenly aware all she has to do is look at him the right way and he’ll just melt.

It wasn’t just Victor he’d spent years looking at in those magazines after all…

She waits patiently by the door as Yuuri grabs his coat, quickly tip toeing back into his room to grab his favourite scarf. Shuffling through the door, he notices Victor is still very much sound asleep, one hand curled by his face, the other stretched out across the space Yuuri had been laying fingers resting like the were still cupped around the warmth of his body.

It takes all of his strength not to immediately strip back down and crawl back into bed next to him, the upturned palm of his hand such a sweet temptation. Keeping his grip firm on the edge of his scarf as he winds it around his neck, he quickly turns away, knowing the look he’ll get from Makka later if he doesn’t come back out.

Victor's puppy-dog eyes are something he’s just about learned to resist… Makakchin’s are a different story.

Deciding he doesn’t want to disturb the pretty picture bundled up behind him, he quickly scribbles him a note and folds it neatly next to his hand. Given the lateness of their arrival and how early it is right now, Yuuri is fairly sure Victor will still be asleep by the time he gets back, but he’d rather be safe than sorry. If Victor is left wandering the inn alone, knowing Yuuri’s luck he’ll bump into Mari and she _ definitely _doesn’t need any sort of bribe to tell him about all his embarrassing childhood stories.

_ Especially when a great many of them involve him gushing over how cool Victor was. _

He does his best to push the sharp cringe of those memories away as he heads back out, but not before leaving one final kiss against the crown of Victor’s head, the deep familiar smell of his shampoo rich in his nose as he whispers his goodbye.

_ “I love you. I’ll be back soon.” _

***

It’s a little brighter when Yuuri lets Makkachin off her leash at the beach. 

Tiger stripes of pink are slowly clawing their way through the darker grey of the clouds as he sits down on the sand to rest his legs, the push and pull of the sea in front of him as quiet as the rustle of turning pages. Despite spring having melted the crueler edges of the cold, there’s still a bite to the early morning air- Yuuri pulling his knees all the way to his lips, his scarf wrapped around him in a tight embrace to keep out the worst of the chill.

Still, it’s nice to have time to himself to just _ think _for once.

The last few months had been such a whirlwind of training plane rides and competitions, he isn’t exactly sure when either him or Victor had time to eat, let alone think about anything that wasn’t skating. 

Yuuri could barely comprehend that they were actually living together in the luxury of Victor’s huge apartment, let alone the fact he’d barely got through the door before Victor was pressing a homemade scone into his hand and moving the medals on his mantelpiece to make room for his own.

Slowly rubbing his fingers against the icy crystals of the sand, he lets his eyes fall to Makkachin softly padding by the shoreline as he tries to sort through the mess of his mind. 

He’s thought about so many things while sitting in this exact position, but never anything like this.

A year ago he thought he had nothing. No direction, no future, the man he’d looked up to for so long offering him a photo like he was some desperate fan rather than his actual competitor. 

And now- now he can’t just think about himself anymore, he has to think about himself _ and _Victor. The ways their career will fit together, what they’re going to do when one or both of them retires, how they’re going to handle being at so many separate competitions next season. 

He drops his head to his knees. They were such important things to think about and yet somehow they hadn’t really crossed his mind since the day he’d put a ring on Victor’s finger.

While he’d never take back even one second of the time they’d spent together over the past year, having him as his coach, competitor and lover did mean there was scarcely a time when they weren’t together. A time when he could fully process just what his life had become.

And how it was nothing like he’d ever expected.

“Ah, there you are.”

He’s pulled out of his thoughts by the familiar voice warmly cutting through the breeze.

He smiles as Victor slowly approaches, standing to greet him properly as Makkachin bounds over. His eyes and cheeks are bright from the cold, hair still a little messy despite most of it hidden beneath the thick blue hat he has on. Yuuri blushes a little when he realises that it’s one of his old beanies- the notion that Victor felt comfortable enough to wear any of his clothes still a new kind of intimacy to him.

“You should have woken me,” Victor says brightly as he rubs Makkachin’s head, briefly looking up and down the empty beach surrounding them. “I forgot how pretty it is here in the morning.” After a few moments, he turns back to Yuuri, face softer than the tide behind them as he reaches out to pull Yuuri into his arms.

“You just looked so peaceful,” Yuuri murmurs as he settles his head against him, sighing as Victor tucks his fingers into the top of his jeans, each press a sweet, solid anchor against his skin. “I know you didn’t catch any sleep on the plane and you deserve a proper rest for once.”

He feels Victor’s answering smile against his hair, his hands squeezing his sides in silent gratitude. Between doing all he can end Yuuri’s season on a high and planning his own return to the ice in the coming months, Yuuri had started to see the toll it was taking on him. 

There’s only so much a smile as a coffee can do to cover the exhaustion Yuuri can see hanging pale and grey from Victor’s face when he collapses into bed at night.

He relaxes a little further into Victor’s embrace as his hands start lightly brushing the skin of his lower back, his lips move in a familiar pattern down his forehead, his cheek, before finally coming to rest properly against his lips.

“I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to kissing you first thing in the morning,” Victor murmurs when they pull apart, the warmth of his breath a sweet contrast to the cold air, “but I guess I’ll just have to find out, won’t I?”

Yuuri knows the deepening flush on his cheeks has nothing to do with the chill. It’s been months and yet somehow Victor still finds ways to disarm him with the cheesiest lines.

Victor regards him fondly for another moment before gently pulling them both down to sit against the sand. “Why come here?” he asks as he spread his legs out in front of him, hand still firmly wrapped around Yuuri’s side. “You’re pretty notorious for hating the cold.”

“It doesn’t bother me that much.”

“You’ve been complaining about it ever since you moved in with me.” Victor tugs on the thick edge of Yuuri’s scarf as if to illustrate his point, chuckling when Yuuri immediately burrows further into the collar of his sweater. “These days you practically live in this thing.”

Yuuri struggles away, trying not to laugh as Victor lightly tickles his face with the edge of the scarf. “I think I just needed to clear my head a little,” he says as he finally pulls himself free from Victor’s teasing grip. “It’s a nice place to just sit and think when I’m not skating.”

Victor cocks his head slightly, before nodding slowly, eyes set onto the erupting gold of the horizon. “I actually used to come here to think as well.”

Yuuri turns to him properly, a little surprised by his words. “About what?”

Victor doesn’t answer for a few moments, eyes still lingering on some faraway spot just above the dance of the sea in front of them. “Just- life I guess. Where I was. Where I am.” He feels Victor’s fingers dig a little bit harder into his side. “If I could really have what I actually wanted for once.”

Yuuri sees the ghost of something a little darker flicker across Victor’s expression, his smile briefly dropping as the quiet of the morning falls softly between them again.

Yuuri opens his mouth to question but quickly shuts it, deciding not to press. 

He’s seen that look before. Looking at old pictures, watching Yurio skate, staring at the glossed image of his own smile in a magazine spread - every so often there’d be a cool distance to him, any movement coming to a stiff halt as whatever he was thinking about played out like a troubled sea behind his eyes.

Yuuri can’t say that it doesn’t worry him a little, especially with how carefully Victor had erected such thick walls around his heart, all negative emotions usually blinked away in an instant with a hand wave and a practised grin.

It’s only recently that Yuuri had felt like he’d found a way to breach those walls a little, yet so much of Victor’s past is still such a mystery to him, most of it he knows Victor still isn’t ready to share.

He wants to push, desperately wants to find out if there was something, _ anything _he could do to take some of that burden he can see digging like iron claws into his shoulders, but he knows demanding an answer isn’t the right way to do it.

Brushing his fingers in the sand again, his thoughts drift back to the first time they came here together.

_ When I open up, he meets me where I am. _

The words still bring him comfort, especially when the weight of the world’s eyes feel like they're boring down on him all at once, at home or under the bleached glare of stadium lights.

Maybe that’s what he needs to do again.

“I used to think about you quite a lot when I came here.” 

He sees Victor surface from his deeper thoughts at the words, an eyebrow raised as he turns back to Yuuri.

“Oh really?” 

“I mean- nothing weird or creepy obviously,” he quickly clarifies, doing his best not to duck his head away as he tries to find the best way to explain what he really means. “When I was younger, I just used to think about what I wanted to do and what kind of skater I wanted to be. It always came back to wanting to… be like you. Wanting to compete on the same ice, win the same medals, be just as good.” Yuuri takes a breath, grounding himself as memories of him trying and failing to copy Victor’s jumps swim to the front of his mind. He can almost still feel the bruises. “It seemed like such an impossibility then.”

Sometimes Yuuri does wonder how his 12-year-old self would react if he could see what was happening now, how every ridiculous fanboy fantasy he’d ever dreamed of had somehow come to fruition- something he’d _ earned _ just by being himself.

It’s such a heady thought, he can feel himself falling into one of the deeper pits into his mind whenever he thinks on it for too long.

He sees Victor slowly take in his words before shuffling impossibly closer, his lips pressed ever so lightly to the flushed curve of Yuuri’s cheek. _ “I think you’ve already proven you’re so much more than ‘just as good.’” _

Yuuri twists a little to gently rest his forehead against Victor’s, the simple affection of the gesture something he come to love when things started feeling a little too heavy around them. “I guess World Records don’t lie.”

The laugh that follows is the loveliest sound to Yuuri's ears. It’s gentle, but it carries sweetly across the empty beach around them, rich and carefree. Yuuri doesn’t fight his satisfied grin as Victor leans back a little, the strain of whatever was weighing on him before melting from his expression as he lightly taps Yuuri’s nose. “I guess we’ll see what next season has in store then.”

They sit in comfortable silence for a few long minutes after that, hands entwined between them as they watch Makakchin bound after the seagulls resting by the retreating tide. It’s one more thing Yuuri can’t quite believe, just how _ easy _things could be between them now.

Barely a year ago, Victor’s touch felt electric, strangely hot, Yuuri too blinded by the achievements of the man watching him to even stand being close to him. Such casual caresses were something he never thought he could even be worthy of, let alone completely comfortable with.

Now he isn’t sure if he can go back to living without them.

“I appreciate that you left me that little note in Russian,” Victor comments softly, lowering his head to rest against Yuuri’s shoulder. “I must say, your Cyrillic was flawless.”

Yuuri smiles, glad that the clunkiness of the language was finally starting to smooth in his brain a little. “I figured with you being so tired it might be easier.”

“I hope you didn’t leave Makkachin waiting too long just so you could write it.”

Yuuri rolls his eyes. “Мой русский лучше, чем вы думаете.” 

“Yuuri!!” He’s pushed back the the force of Victor’s surprised flail, joy suddenly blooming across his features. “You can’t just spring that on me without warning!!”

“What??”

“Come on!! Hearing you speak in my native tongue so easily like that… you must pick up languages fast!” He claps his hands under his chin as he speaks, eyes sparkling brightly.

It’s _ adorable. _

Yuuri clears his throat a little awkwardly, both embarrassed and happy at such an explosive reaction. “Not really.”

“How long have you been learning?”

Yuuri bites his lips, briefly considering whether to tell him the real answer or not. “About…ten years,” he eventually murmurs.

Victor’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise. “Why have you never mentioned this before? That’s so impressive.” When Yuuri doesn’t answer, a realisation dawns on his face. He lowers his head, voice soft. “Did you do it for me?”

Yuuri cringes a little, feeling like he’s just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He’d spent so many years practising everything he’d wanted to say to Victor in Russian, only to be blind-sided by his near-perfect English, something he was already fluent in thanks to college. 

“I mean… I thought that if we ever actually met one day it might be easier if- if we ever...” he trails off, fingers pressing harder into the sand as he tries to tiptoe around the depth of his obsession when he was younger.

He feels Victor laugh again. It doesn’t feel as sweet.

“Oh my that’s so adorable.”

Yuuri knows the tease in his voice isn’t malicious, but that doesn’t stop its sting as he hears it.

“Don’t,” he mumbles lamely as he shifts away a little, trying to hide the colder embarrassment blooming on his face. “I just I- I know it’s weird.”

_ “Yuuri.” _His face is slowly guided back with gloved fingers. He almost hates how wide Victor’s grin is as he speaks. “You don’t need to explain. I know I was your idol, I’ve seen the all posters and Mari might have offered to show me your diary at more than one point-”

“Yes and I know it’s weird, so we don’t have to go on about it!” It comes out a little sharper than he wanted it to, Victor’s mouth snapping closed at the sudden outburst.

He pulls back a little, expression suddenly a little wary. “Yuuri?” 

Yuuri stares at the floor for a few seconds, dreading what’s coming next. “I’m sorry. It’s just - I don’t know if I’ll ever really get over that part of our relationship.”

“What do you mean?”

Yuuri takes a breath, slowly tugging a stray thread on his scarf. He’s always known that they needed to have this conversation at some point, but he’d felt so embarrassed by the whole thing he’d just pushed it to the furthest corner of his mind in the hope that if he just ignored it long enough, the situation would resolve itself.

Looking to Victor’s open face now, he knows that they can’t avoid it forever.

Sighing softly, he does his best to push down the burn of awkward shame in his throat. “I- I was your fan Victor. And a really really big one at that. I had every poster, followed every event, I even named my _ dog _ after you.” He closes his eyes for a moment as the painful flash of Vicchan’s memory ghosts through his mind. “You just don’t normally hear about people like you ending up with people like- like me.” He can’t help but turn away as it’s all laid out, the truth painful on his tongue. “How can it really be equal when I spent so much of my life- _ obsessing _over you.”

He hates the words that leave his mouth, but he knows it’s the only way to describe it. 

And also that this isn’t news to either of them.

He watches Victor process the words, eyes carefully trained to Yuuri’s face, his bottom lip caught ever so slightly between his teeth.

Yuuri feels something cold unfurl in his stomach. He knows that look.

Victor really doesn’t know what to say.

Yuuri drops his head to stare down at the ground, counting each discoloured grain of sand as he waits for the inevitable. He can almost already hear it: the pity, the shame, the slightly embarrassed look Victor would have in his eye every time they were in his old place.

Yuuri swallows the burning breath building in his throat as the silence stretches on.

He knows that he can’t change his past. But he’d always hoped it wasn’t going to ruin his future. Not when things were _ finally _going so well.

It’s when he opens his mouth to stammer out another lame apology that Victor finally speaks.

“You know, they always photoshop my freckles out of those posters.”

Yuuri’s head slowly raises, eyebrows furrowed.

_ Okay, not the answer he was expecting. _

“Really?”

Victor nods slowly, cool expression not faltering. “Every single one since I was 15.”

Yuuri hadn’t spent enough time looking at his poster collection recently to really realise, but it seemed like such a stupid thing to change. He thinks back to the first time he saw them, trying not to be overtly obvious as he stared at the small constellations blooming across Victor’s nose and shoulders as he sat naked across from him in the onsen. He’d fallen in love with them pretty instantly, spending more than one night secretly tracing them with his eyes, and then later with the softest of touches, marvelling at just how… human they were, tiny little grains flecked across the perfect porcelain of his skin.

“But they’re nice,” Yuuri murmurs, his gaze lingering on a few of the freckles still just visible on the reddened bridge of his nose. “Why didn’t you want people to see them?”

“I never asked them to be removed. They just were.” He follows Yuuri’s gaze to the small cluster on his peeking out above the cuff of his coat. “The fact that they did it wasn’t something that really bothered me until recently. I guess they just saw them as, well, less than perfect.”

Yuuri’s confusion deepens a little. “That’s stupid.”

Victor nods slowly, carefully drawing his knees up to his chin as he continues. “I know. But my marketing team didn’t want the world to see anything less than perfect.” He tucks his chin against his chest slightly, voice dropping. “See _ me as _anything less than perfect.”

Yuuri is right back at his side again in an instant, hands a gentle pressure on Victor’s shoulders. The old ache in his voice is something familiar, a pain he’s seen swimming with a sharp sting only once before.

When he said he was retiring.

“You’re already perfect,” he urges quietly, hands squeezing in a firm reassurance. “Just like this. Anyone worth anything knows that.”

Victor turns with a weak smile. It doesn’t quite meet his eyes. “Well I have to be,” he answers softly, words shamed and cold, almost like a confession. “It’s why I really hate giving interviews half the time.”

Yuuri nods softly, aware they’re both treading on very new and unstable ground here. Times when Victor truly opened up were few and far between, usually quick and quiet murmurs against the curve of Yuuri’s collarbone under the comforting blankets of night and never spoken of the next morning. All Yuuri wants now is to make sure Victor knows where he stands. That he's always here to listen. “Well, I think I can safely say you’re one of the most interviewed people in our profession.”

“Exactly. But you know I can’t exactly say what I really want to half the time.” His voice is open, raw. Every other word starting to catch in his throat a little as he continues. “It’s the price of being in the public eye. Everything I said- everything I still say has been calculated and perfected to maintain a certain reputation that’s been cultivated for me.”

Yuuri squeezes his shoulders a little harder. “Victor-”

“Being considered one of my country’s heroes is something I’ll always be proud of, but- but it also means I have to do everything I can to make sure I stay that way.” 

Yuuri’s heart tightens at the cold shake to his words. He’s all too aware of the feeling- the feeling of wearing a painted smile, having the perfectly practised demeanour to impress sponsors, having words put in your mouth as the press approaches, a hand just that little bit too tight on his shoulder as questions were asked of him. 

“I’m not perfect,” Victor whispers, “not by a long way, but I have to act like I am.” He pauses for a second to shift his body further towards Yuuri’s. “And I don’t think anyone could ever really know me just from what’s been recorded of my life.”

Yuuri’s eyes widen a little when he realises what Victor is trying to say. 

He knows Victor hates talking about his past, about any feelings that can’t be laughed away or scrubbed off in the heat of a shower- and yet here he is. Opening up one of the rawest and most painful parts of himself just to try and reassure Yuuri about what they had. 

Just to try and make _ him _feel better.

Yuuri swallows, overwhelmed by the weight of the feelings he can feel hanging in the air around them.

This might be the most personal thing Victor has ever done for him, that _ anyone _has ever done for him.

_ So why does he still feel like a fraud? _

“That doesn’t change who I am, that I dug for all that information,” he eventually answers, the embarrassed feelings from before starting to swirl in an unpleasant mix in his gut. “You have to admit it’s a bit-”

“All of that’s been public record for years,” Victor gently cuts him off, expression firm. “Do you really think it would bother me? You admired one version of me… and you’re still here after you go to see the rest. Frankly I expect most people to turn and run once they actually get to know me.”

Yuuri almost bites down a laugh. “You can’t be serious.” 

His smile immediately drops when Victor’s expression doesn’t change.

“People make a version of you in their minds and you can never live up to it. There’s a reason people tell you not to meet your heroes." Victor pauses for another second, taking a long steadying breath. "If we’re being honest, when I became you’re coach, part of me was nervous that I’d never be the person that you thought I was.”

Yuuri feels like his world has turned on his axis at the words. “Really?”

Victor is silent for another minute, breaths slow as he looks back to the ocean. “The minute I realised I loved you, it was such a wonderful feeling. But I was also so terrified that I just couldn’t be the person you thought I was.” Victor's voice is as soft as the scarf around his shoulders, but Yuuri can see the sadness crinkling around his eyes, the tremble of fear cold and heavy in his words. “I don’t think that person even exists. And I keep thinking that one day you’re going to realise that and just...” he trails off, eyes closing heavily as he swallows back whatever bitter sentiment was stuck in his throat.

Yuuri takes a few seconds to turn over the weight of Victor’s words.

The last few months had been the happiest of Yuuri’s life. Despite the exhaustion, the stress and the pain of finishing the season, the fact that he had Victor by his side made every second worth it. When he looked at him with those beautiful eyes he felt weightless, when they skated it was like he was flying, when his anxiety shook him awake and sneered in his ear that he wasn’t good enough, Victor was there with warm touches and sweet words against his skin until it went away - and through all of that Victor had been scared that he wasn’t enough. That Yuuri was just going to up and leave.

Yuuri feels a piece of his heart shatter in his chest.

It almost felt ridiculous. The idea that Victor could even begin to fathom that he wasn’t enough for Yuuri sounded like some kind of cruel joke.

Yuuri had thought the opposite plenty of times, there only had to be one comment on a picture of them together about Yuuri punching above his weight for him to be sent into a mental tailspin, sitting awake at night waiting for the moment when Victor was going to realise he could do so much better than someone like him.

And Victor had been feeling that himself too. Perhaps even longer than he had.

Studying Victor’s face, he sees the pained honesty splashed across his features, the burning brim of tears welling in the corner of his eyes and it makes him hurt just that little bit more.

Victor really did think that about himself. And Yuuri isn’t going to let that stand for even a minute longer.

Victor’s face is between his hands in an instant, forehead a breath from his own as he settles on his knees in front of him. He waits for Victor to meet his eyes again before he starts to speak, enunciating each word firmly and clear. “You listen to me Victor Nikiforov. You are the reason I started skating, the reason I fought to get where I am, and now you’re the reason I’m going to keep working so hard.” His voice grows stronger as he continues, words he’d kept deep and secret inside his heart finally flowing free like a river bursting from his lips. “You’re everything and nothing like I first thought- you’re determined and passionate and soft and so _ so _aggravating at times- but you are still everything to me.” He lets his eyes fall closed as he rests his head against Victor’s again, words dropping to barely a whisper. “Just in a different way now.”

Victor is quiet for a few seconds after Yuuri finishes, his expression wide with surprise. Slowly he shifts so he can kneel across from Yuuri, carefully reaching over to wrap his arms around his neck until there was barely a whisper of space between them. Yuuri can feel each breath against his skin, each fluttering heartbeat from his wrist as he brings them together, the hair falling from his hat a soft tickle against his face as he slowly kisses both of Yuuri’s cheeks before leaning back. “And you are still finding new ways to surprise me every single day. No matter what I do, you always find just the right thing to say to me.” The smile that accompanies his words is the most beautiful thing Yuuri has seen all morning, any trace of those previous fears whispered away of the cool spring breeze around them. Victor leans in to lightly kiss the tip of his nose before he continues, the gesture silly but still achingly sweet. “I don’t think there’ll ever be enough time for me to tell you just how much you mean to me.”

Yuuri doesn’t fight his smile as he pulls them both to their feet so he can hold Victor properly, head resting over the soft bend of his shoulder. “Well how does forever sound?”

He feels the vibration of Victor’s chuckle against his skin as his face is slowly guided back, Victor's smile brighter than the gold of the sunrise burning bold and strong behind them. 

“Perfect,” he whispers, taking a second to slowly trace the curve of Yuuri’s lips before leaning in to lay a feather’s kiss against them. _ “My Yuuri.” _

Yuuri wonders in that moment if it’s possible to die from love. It’s strange, but hearing such adoration uttered from Victor like it was the easiest thing in the world, it just felt… right somehow. Like the final piece of an old jigsaw slowly slotting into place.

He takes a second to look back at the wonderful, impossible man in his arms.

Victor really was everything he’d thought, but also so much more. Yes, Victor in reality was still a man that burned with an unparalleled intensity when he skated, having skills as unforgiving and hard as the ice they stood on just as he’d seen a thousand times on the screen of his laptop or phone- but now he also knows that that same man also likes to wake Yuuri up at 2AM to drowsily ramble about some skating epiphany he had in his sleep, that he really _ really _likes having neck kissed in the morning and that Yuuri was one of about three people who had actually seen him in his chunky reading glasses.

Yuuri loops his arms around Victor’s torso, resting his face against his shoulder again so he can breathe in the cool scent of the morning air on his clothes.

“It's funny,” he murmurs, nuzzling his face against the skin of the other man’s neck. “Back then I had no idea that the man on my posters could be quite so… _ real.” _He feels Victor’s arms tighten around him in silent gratitude. “Or that he had such a big…”

“Yuuri!” 

He pulls back laughing, gently setting a finger against Victor’s bottom lip. 

“I was going to say heart,” he says teasingly, before leaning in to breathe against his ear with his last bout of early-morning courage, “but what you were thinking was also a nice surprise.” 

He can feel the burn of Victor’s cheek against his own as the words leave his mouth. He can’t help leaning back slightly to enjoy the full view of that lovely blush spreading slowly down his throat, like a rosy paint slowly diffusing in water. 

Just another thing to add to the ever-growing list of charms belonging to the man in his arms.

“You _really_ aren’t going to ever stop surprising me, are you?” Victor eventually chuckles.

Yuuri shakes his head slowly, leaning back to the warm pink of Victor’s ear. “Only if you don’t. I want to spend every day of our lives learning about the real you.” 

He feels Victor’s skin heat a little more at his whisper, the look in his eyes when he pulls back something Yuuri has only come to know only as pure love. “I want that too,” he whispers, tangling Yuuri’s gloved fingers with his own so he can pull them to the soft curve of his lips. “I just hope that _ this _me is everything you need.”

For the first time all morning, Yuuri couldn’t care less about the cold. Right here in their own soft frozen moment holding each other on this beach, he really can’t feel anything but the warmth blooming in his chest and the weight of love in Victor’s eyes resting on his face. 

The thought of _ forever _used to terrify him a little, the secret fear that what they had could be as fleeting as the frost melting around them was something he thought he’d never shake. But knowing that Victor had been scared too, that he really thought he couldn’t be enough for Yuuri… now he knows they both have the strength to face it together.

On this very spot Victor had taken his hand in a promise to be nothing but himself, and now a year later it had bloomed into a promise of forever- the thought of what the coming years could bring has a deep nervous excitement fluttering in his chest. 

Yuuri knew this man, but he didn’t as well. It had been a joy to watch the celebrity skate, but now he knows it’ll be his privilege to keep unravelling more of the mystery that was Victor Nikiforov.

Yuuri leans up on the balls of his feet, resting his hands against the back of Victor’s neck to finally pull their lips together again.

“I know he is,” Yuuri whispers, the hushed confession a feather’s kiss against Victor’s skin.

_ “And I fell in love with him long ago.” _

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi to me on [Tumblr](https://ravensmores.tumblr.com/) \- @ravensmores  
Or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/RavensmoresFics) \- @ravensmoresfics


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